


bourbon, or something stronger

by hobbitts



Category: Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-20
Updated: 2013-04-20
Packaged: 2017-12-08 23:58:24
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,747
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/767611
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hobbitts/pseuds/hobbitts
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Crowley is in distress and Aziraphale attempts to help with a bit of massage therapy. One-shot. Written way too late at night to have no errors (apologies in advance about that!)</p>
            </blockquote>





	bourbon, or something stronger

Crowley slammed the door to his apartment and flung himself down on the designer sofa (which sighed gratefully as the purpose it was intended to serve many years before was finally fulfilled). He shoved his face into the arm rest and groaned. Hastur, that contemptuous bastard, had finally gotten orders to condemn Crowley for his involvement, or lack thereof, in almost bringing about the apocalypse. Hell and its inhabitants were becoming rather restless after a month of simmering in 700o\+ temperatures. Crowely had narrowly avoided a confrontation with Hastur. He’d fled in his newly remodeled Bentley, tires screeching, and engine smoking, and whatever other distractions to other drivers he could think of. 

Quite frankly, he was exhausted. Not physically—that could be fixed in no time at all. He needed a vacation.

Crowley rolled over and rubbed his hands over his face, pushing his sunglasses into his hair, revealing bright yellow eyes that quickly squeezed shut. He didn’t even have enough energy to feel angry. A bottle of Bourbon dragged itself over from the kitchen cupboard and Crowley poured a shot down his throat. The Bourbon turned to something stronger. He took another drink. And another.

The doorbell rang. Damn. That’d be Aziraphale. He slid off the couch, cursing himself for forgetting about dinner, and buzzed the angel in. Aziraphale walked through the door carrying a tinfoil-covered plate. He saw Crowley slouched against the sofa, tie undone and hair disheveled, and raised his eyebrows before setting the food down in the kitchenette around the corner.

“They giving you hell?” Aziraphale called over the clatter of the plates as he set them on the table.

Crowley grunted and took another swig from the bottle. The alcohol sloshed in his empty stomach. He pretended it was helping.

The smell of tomato sauce and filled the room as Aziraphale walked in with two servings of lasagna. One pointed look from the angel and the food began to steam pleasantly. It reminded Crowley of a high-end restaurant in Italy, 1930’s. He’d been carrying out a series of orders from Below. Nice dictatorship. Better food. 

Crowley avoided Aziraphale’s gaze and wrapped himself protectively around the bottle.

“Your lot keeping in touch?” asked Crowley.

“Not really, no, but it’s what’s to be expected,” said Aziraphale. He sat down on the couch and crossed his legs, balancing the plate on his knee. A sigh from Crowley. Another shot.

“I’d turn on the TV or something but ah…” Crowley made a weak gesture. “You know. Hate mail from the underworld and all that.”

Aziraphale nodded slowly. Crowley looked…unsettled. More so than usual. They sat in silence, neither touching their food, the pasta getting sticky and the bits of meat and tomato sauce beginning to crust over. Aziraphale watched Crowley watch the sky slowly fade to a dark violet. The flat was absolutely silent except for the occasional _putputput_ from the fridge. Neither was breathing. Neither had to.

Crowley worked the bottle in his hands, fingers picking at the label. Bits of paper littered the carpet around him. There was a large crash outside as one of the neighbor’s bins fell over and suddenly Crowley’s shoulders tightened and the bottle exploded all over the demon, the designer carpet, and Aziraphale, and Crowley liked to think he hadn’t meant it.

“Son of a bitch!” yelled Crowley. 

Aziraphale sat, frozen, pieces of glass tinkling down on the plate and the coffee table and the tile surrounding the small island of carpet.

“They— ” began Crowley, feeling the need to explain himself, which never happened except when he was around the angel. The word died somewhere in the middle of his throat. He tried again. “They expect me to be working…I have to report back tomorrow. Two months’ work in one night, or I’m promised some terrible punishment or other and they fucking mean it.” Aziraphale winced at Crowley’s choice language. 

Crowley clenched his fists, glass digging into his skin, then stretched out his fingers and watched as the small cuts sewed themselves back together. He repeated the action, completely focused. Well, he was also focused little bit on Aziraphale. But mostly on his hands. Good. The pain was distracting. 

One of the more wilted plants spontaneously combusted.

“Crowley.” Aziraphale put his plate down and leaned forward. Crowley frowned and continued squeezing his hands together, drops of blood seeping out before being absorbed back into the skin. Aziraphale gently took the demon’s hands in his own.

“Crowley,” he said again. 

Crowley breathed. It felt good.

“Yeah,” he muttered, letting the angel brush the shards off his hands. The other’s touch was cool and soft and interesting enough that it brought him back to earth.

Aziraphale returned Crowley’s hands to himself and patted the couch, but Crowley refused to get up off the floor. He didn’t feel like sobering up. Not yet. In fact, he felt like never sobering up ever again; there wasn’t much to look forward to. _All I’d be doing, anyway, would be running from Hell,_ he thought, _with nowhere to run to._

“I’d come with you, you know,” said Aziraphale quietly, reading the Crowley’s thoughts.

“What, and leave your bookshop? You wouldn’t—”

“I would. I mean it, demon dear.”

“I—” began Crowley. But he didn’t know how to continue, exactly. Part of him breathed a sigh of relief ( _my_ angel—with _me_ ), part of him whined, and part of him just wanted to take a nice piss. (That part would be his bladder. He transported his urine to the floor of the neighbor’s dining room. That made him feel a little bit better.)

There was a quiet scraping noise as Aziraphale gathered up all the broken glass into a neat pile with a small nodding motion of his head, and the bourbon-or-something-stronger turned to water so the carpet wouldn’t reek. On second thought, he gave the water the faint scent of old wood after centuries of cold weather, and a touch of must, and a touch of spice, and underneath it all a whiff of well-brewed breakfast tea. He remembered Crowley telling him that the barn they’d sheltered in in Siberia, 1891, had smelled especially pleasant. 

Crowley smiled weakly.

“I feel like shit,” he said with finality. “I’ve been thinking. Do you…think we’ve got expiration dates? I mean—” he put his hands to his head “—of course we’re immortal but that doesn’t mean we can be...I don't know, taken out of service.”

Aziraphale had rarely seen Crowley afraid before—but he had. Enough to know that the tremor in the demon’s hands was not caused solely by the alcohol in his system. Aziraphale placed a hand on Crowley’s back and scooted closer so his leg rested against a slightly shaking shoulder. 

“I don’t know. But if that’s what’s going to happen, it’s part of the ineffable pl—”

“Damn the ineffable plan!” shouted Crowley. Aziraphale looked absolutely shocked and it took Crowley no less than a second to mumble a “sorry” in quieter tones. 

Aziraphale placed a second hand on Crowley’s back and began to gently massage his tense shoulders. Crowley remained silent. 

Aziraphale found he couldn’t tell the difference between hard, knotted muscle and bone in Crowley’s back. “Goodness,” he said out loud as his fingertips brushed over an especially hard lump. “Feels like you’ve got tumors in your back.” Crowley rolled his shoulders and cracked several vertebrae not a second before Aziraphale dug his fingers into a sore spot right at the base of Crowley’s neck. The demon jerked away, fast.

“Just left me fix it,” he whined. “When did you even take a massage class? Early eighteenth century?”

“Trust me,” said Aziraphale. “And no, it was 1977.”

“Ah yes, right along with your psychedelic hippie phase which blossomed a decade or so late.” 

Aziraphale told Crowley to fuck off in the most polite way possible. Crowley inched back so Aziraphale’s hands rested on his back once again.

“Be gentle.” It was more of a plea than a command.

“Trust me,” was all Aziraphale said again as he began to rub at Crowley’s neck, softer this time. 

“I do,” replied Crowley under his breath. Then, even quieter, “Bugger.”

It was painful and sore but once Aziraphale moved down to somewhere along the bottom of his trapezius muscles he could feel a new sort of looseness beginning to spread through his upper back. It felt …sweet.

“Stop a moment,” said Crowley, and the hands obeyed. He shed his jacket, and, after a second’s deliberation, his shirt as well. He sat back. Aziraphale was now more hesitant, his fingertips testing the new surface, and he realized he’d never actually touched Crowley before. Crowley hissed and shivered as the angel’s fingers made contact with his skin. 

“Your hands are freezing.”

“Sorry.”

They instantly warmed. 

Crowley closed his eyes and shivered again. He could feel a rush of goose bumps working their way up his arms. 

Everything suddenly felt very thick, like the air had the consistency of tar. Crowley struggled to open his mouth, to say something to Aziraphale, but now he couldn’t remember exactly what it was.

“Crowley, I’m going to do something,” said Aziraphale. Crowley only barely registered his name.

“It’s going to hurt,” whispered Aziraphale. Crowley nodded. He knew the angel was speaking but he couldn’t make out the words. He had just registered “going” when a terrible pain erupted somewhere on his back, a pain both hollow and pressured that made Crowley screech and hiss and writhe. His very insides were on fire and his mind was spread out too far and everything felt too fast and too slow all at once—

Then Aziraphale removed his hands and the pain was gone. 

Both were panting. There were feathers everywhere. Crowley’s ears rang at such a high pitch he was sure he was just imagining it, and he felt like there was a horrible hole somewhere below his ribs. But there was also a warm stillness beginning to fill the empty space. Normally this would have put him off but…

That’s when he looked down and noticed the pool of oily black slick slowly spreading out from where he was sitting. He looked at his hands and saw he was sweating out the same stuff. 

“How did—” asked Crowley, breathlessly.

Aziraphale shook his head and stood up, feathers flying everywhere. “You’re in need of a shower,” he said, extending his hand towards Crowley.

The demon took it and followed him obediently.


End file.
